They weren’t necessarily bills.
Except…they most definitely were—for they were addressed to the Marquess of Lydon. He didn’t receive any other sort of mail, and she received no mail at all, except for her weekly letter from Artemis, who had run off to the wilds of Yorkshire, improbably, only to establish a horse sanctuary.
Actually, not improbably.
Artemis had lost her beloved Thoroughbred, Dido, during the season-opening race and had been utterly devastated. But in true Artemis fashion, she’d found a way to channel the loss into something useful—she’d established a horse sanctuary on the estate she’d inherited from her grandmother. Though it might be better described an any-animal-that-happened-down-the-lane sanctuary. There was even a one-eyed sheepdog named Bathsheba, who Beatrix sensed was in the running for Artemis’s best bosom friend.
With each letter, Beatrix could see her friend’s customary brightness of spirit returning, and if that was what it took for Artemis to return to herself, then Beatrix had no choice but to be glad for her.
In the stack presently occupying her lap, however, there was no such letter to cut through the gloom.
She lifted the top missive and felt no qualm about breaking the seal. Someone had to—and heaven knew it wouldn’t be Lydon. No, that onerous task was hers alone in their household of three, when one included Cumberbatch—which one must. Not only was he another mouth to feed, but the fact was she interacted with the old valet more often than she did with Lydon, who popped into the house once or twice a week and only then at odd times and intervals.
The opened letter confirmed what she’d already known—a bill. Twenty quid for a new pair of boots? She’d paid five shillings for the boots presently on her feet—seven years ago.
A sudden, wet plop landed on the bridge of her nose, startling her into the present.
A raindrop.
The rain the sky had been promising all morning had announced its arrival.
Further, it was keeping its other promise by fully opening at once and pouring sheets of water onto all heads with the bad luck and poor judgment to have been out of doors in the first place. Threats of rain tended to keep their promise in London.
The park transformed into a flurry of wet chaos as horses bolted this way and that, ladies exclaiming in both delight and distress, lords fumbling about with the leather hoods of their curricles, all scurrying about in desperate search of shelter and scattering to the four winds.
Beatrix shoved journal, pencils, and bills into her satchel—though she’d been sorely tempted to let wind and rain carry the latter away. Bag in one hand, the other clamped onto her bonnet, she braced herself against the heavy sheets of rain blasting into her face, pointed herself in the general direction of home, and willed her feet into motion. She knew where she was going—approximately—so she didn’t particularly need her eyes.
Then she heard and felt it—the thundering of hooves…approaching…fast. Of a sudden, a frenzied blur of motion appeared and was nearly upon her before she could blink. A shocked cry flew from her mouth as she instinctively hunched into a protective huddle and pivoted—twisting her ankle in the process and producing another cry, this one strident with swift, sharp pain. She collapsed to the ground, losing her grip on the satchel as reflex had her attempting to cushion her fall with an extended hand. The sudden pain in her wrist elicited yet another cry.
The rider jumped from his mount and lowered into a crouch above her, incensed blue eyes six inches from hers. “What areyou thinking, woman?” he shouted into her face. “Running blind on a horse path during a rainstorm?”
For an instant, Beatrix felt no pain—only sheer incredulity at both question and questioner.
The audacity!
As for the man who asked it…
She blinked away the rain collected in her eyelashes, for surely they were casting illusions. But, no, those accusatory eyes… They weren’t merely blue. They were the most glacially aquamarine-blue eyes one was ever likely to behold.
Lord Devil.
“What wasIthinking?” she blasted. “That I wanted to get out of the rain?”
The words had hardly left her mouth before her ankle and wrist were barking their displeasure, and the ensuing gasp of pain resolved in a groan.
Without hesitation, his hands were upon her, one closing around an elbow and the other clamped around her shoulder. Indignation shot through her. “What, pray tell, do you think you’re about? Isn’t it enough that you’ve run me down with your horse? Now you’re accosting me?”
Incredulous black eyebrows winged together. “Oh, blast it, woman, would you rather be carried away with Noah’s flood? Or accept my help?”
Beatrix’s heart beat out three heavy thuds as she considered her options.
Even as she knew she had only the one.
She exhaled a lengthy, resigned sigh.
And relented.
CHAPTER THREE
